Geek Abroad

by Piper Banks

“Wait! What are you doing tomorrow?” Dex asked.

  I looked up. “Tomorrow? Nothing!” I said quickly.

  “Do you want to get together? We could maybe go for a walk, or catch a movie, or whatever you want,” he said.

  “Yes. I’d like that,” I said. Which was maybe the understatement of the year. A bubble of happiness was swelling inside my chest, and I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if I floated up off the ground.

  “Great! I’ll come pick you up at the beach house at five,” he said.

  “Okay,” I said. “Oh, wait! No!”

  Dex looked startled.

  “I mean, no, not at the beach house. I’ll be at my house. My real house. With my mom. She’s home for a visit. I’m staying with her while she’s here.”

  “Okay. I’ll pick you up at your mom’s house then,” Dex said, smiling his crooked grin at me. “Bye, Miranda.”

  “Bye,” I said happily. We exchanged one last meaningful look, and then he turned and followed his teammates back toward the school. Suddenly, he stopped and wheeled around.

  “Wait,” he said, calling back to me. “Where does your mom live?”

  I laughed and caught up with him. “Don’t worry. I have an excellent sense of direction,” I said.

  Chapter 24

  To: mirandajbloom@gmail.com

  From: hewent@britmail.net

  Subject: cheers

  Hi Miranda,

  Thanks for your e-mail, and for letting me know about Dex. We can definitely continue being pen pals. And who knows? Maybe we’ll meet up again if you come to London to visit your mum.

  Best wishes,

  Henry

  “I can’t believe you’re leaving already. It seems like you just got here,” I complained.

  I was sitting cross-legged on Sadie’s four-poster bed, watching her pack. She was still wearing her dark hair in a short, sleek bob, and she looked like she’d lost a little weight. I was especially glad to see that she seemed to have finally gotten over her Stevie Nicks phase and was no longer wearing long, flowy hippie dresses. Instead she now seemed to favor smart pantsuits and red lipstick. It was a good look on her.

  “I know, this week has just flown by,” Sadie said. She folded a sweater and laid it in her suitcase. She glanced up at me, her eyes twinkling with mischief. “Of course, you’ve spent it with your head in the clouds.”

  “I have not,” I protested. Then, thinking again of the time I’d spent with Dex, I grinned. “Okay, maybe a little.”

  I was starting to understand why Charlie had gone into such a lovestruck stupor when she started dating Mitch. I just felt so good, so unbelievably happy whenever I thought of Dex. Of course, I also remembered how annoying Charlie had been, so I made a point of tempering my giddiness when I was around my friends and family. Maybe I hadn’t been doing as good a job of that as I’d thought.

  “So, I was thinking,” Sadie said. She looked suddenly serious. “Why don’t you think about coming and living with me in London next year?”

  The one sour note of the week had been learning that Sadie was planning to extend her stay in London. Her original plan had been to stay for one year; now she wasn’t sure when she would be returning home.

  “What about school?” I asked.

  “You can go to school there,” Sadie said. “I think it would be a fabulous experience for you.”

  She was right. Living in London would be amazing. But how could I leave now that Dex and I were finally together? Then again, I didn’t want to be the sort of girl who would turn down a once-in-a-lifetime experience for a guy. No matter how much I liked him.

  “You wouldn’t have to continue living with your father and . . . that woman,” Sadie said, her nostrils flaring at the thought of Peyton.

  I had to admit, that made her offer even more tempting. The tension between Dad and Peyton had been so thick lately, even Willow had sensed it. She’d been slinking around with her tail between her legs. It had taken a full week back home—my mom’s house, that is—for her to unwind.

  “It’s a big decision,” I finally said. “May I think about it?”

  “Absolutely,” Sadie said, closing her suitcase, and zipping it shut. “Take all the time you need, darling.”

  “When I find out who’s behind this, I’m going to make them pay!” Felicity snarled. She looked around our Modern Lit classroom and seemed to crackle with fury.

  Class hadn’t started, and Mrs. Gordon hadn’t yet arrived, but the rest of the class was there and seated at their desks. I was sitting between Finn and Charlie, although, for once, I didn’t have to take on the role of peacekeeper. Finn and Charlie had managed to put their differences aside, although certain topics—Mitch, Grounded, and the Sims among them—were off-limits by tacit agreement.

  “What’s up, Felicity?” Charlie asked. “Did your boyfriend finally figure out that you can only be killed by being stabbed in the heart with a wooden stake?”

  “Ha, ha,” Felicity sneered. “You think you’re so funny, you purple-haired freak.”

  “Actually, yes,” Charlie said serenely. “Yes, I do.”

  Finn and I snickered. Felicity looked at me, her moss green eyes narrowed malevolently.

  “Don’t think I don’t know what’s going on, Miranda,” she said.

  “That’s good,” I said. “Because I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Right. Like you didn’t write it!”

  “Write what?” I asked, genuinely perplexed.

  “That geekhigh.com blog,” Felicity spat. “The one that you convinced the headmaster you have nothing to do with.”

  Actually, I didn’t write the blog; it was Finn’s. And last time I’d checked, the blog had been on hiatus. I opened my laptop, clicked on a browser and typed in geekhigh.com. Charlie leaned forward to read over my shoulder.

  RIBBIT, RIBBIT

  Which Geek High singing sensation was knocked out of the American Idol competition in the first round? GEEKHIGH. COM has learned that this inaptly named diva flubbed a Mariah Carey cover so badly, one of the judges said she sounded like a gargling frog. Developing . . .

  “Did you really audition for American Idol, Felicity?” I asked, looking up at her over the top of my computer.

  “Shut it,” Felicity snarled. “And for your information, I was getting over laryngitis that day.”

  “I wonder if they’ll show her audition on the air,” Charlie said. “Please, let them do it.” She looked up at the ceiling in mock prayer. “God, if you’re a fair and just God, please let them air Felicity’s gargling-frog audition. If you do that, I’ll never ask for anything ever again. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Amen.”

  “Amen,” I echoed.

  While part of me knew that it was mean to laugh at Felicity’s misfortune . . . it was really, really hard not to take some pleasure in it.

  What goes around comes around, as Sadie always says. And it looked like Felicity’s nastiness had finally come around and nailed her.

  “How’s life back at your dad’s house?” Dex asked the next day. We were walking down the beach, hand in hand, Willow trailing behind us. The tide was coming in, and the water was dark and rumbling like thunder as it washed up on the shore.

  “It’s a little weird,” I said. “I think my dad and stepmom are still fighting, but they don’t fight the way my parents used to before they split up. Dad and Peyton don’t yell or throw things. It’s more like the whole house has gone icy cold. No one’s talking much.”

  “That sucks,” Dex said. He squeezed my hand. “It’s too bad your mom couldn’t stay for the summer, so you could get a break from living with them.”

  “Yeah, it is,” I said.

  I hadn’t yet told Dex about Sadie’s offer for me to live with her in London. I knew he’d encourage me to go, that he wouldn’t want me to miss out on the experience because of him. But I still hadn’t decided what I wanted to do.

  Just that morning, I’d gotten an e-mail
from the editor of the Ampersand, our school’s literary journal, inviting me to join the staff next year. It was a huge honor to be asked, since there was always a lot of competition for the few open spots each year. I’d planned to apply for one of the open positions in the fall, but the incoming editor-in-chief, Ramona Jones, had told me in her e-mail that I’d been selected early because of having made the finals of the Winston Creative Writing Contest. Ramona said that if I had that sort of talent, the Ampersand would love to have me on staff. So even though I hadn’t been able to make it to the finals of the writing contest, and would never know if I might have won had I gone, something good—something amazing, in fact—had still come of it.

  And now I was torn. On the one hand, there was London, a city I’d already fallen in love with and couldn’t wait to visit again, and Sadie, and not having to live with Peyton anymore. On the other hand, there was Dex, my friends, the Ampersand, and Geek High. I had no idea what I should do. But the one thing I knew for sure was that I had to make the decision myself.

  So out loud, I said, “It’s going to be a long, hot summer. I don’t think I can handle spending all my time at the beach house, not if Dad and Peyton are still fighting. Maybe I should get a job or an internship or something.”

  Dex stopped and gently tugged on my hand, so that I turned to face him. Willow grunted, but was quickly distracted by sniffing a bunch of seaweed that had washed ashore.

  “I think it’s going to be a great summer,” Dex said softly.

  The sand was hot under my bare feet, but staring into Dex’s pale eyes, I barely noticed it. Then he bent down to kiss me, his warm lips pressing softly against mine. After a few delicious minutes, Dex leaned back and looked down at me, his eyes squinting a bit from the bright sunlight.

  “You do?” I asked. My voice sounded a little shaky. It was the effect Dex’s kisses always had on me. Everything went shaky—my voice, my knees, my toes.

  Dex lifted a hand and brushed a stray lock of my hair back, tucking it behind my ear. I shivered at his touch. He misread my goose bumps, thinking that the breeze blowing off the ocean was chilling me, and he rubbed my arms with his hands, as though to warm me.

  “Yeah,” Dex said. “I do. I think it’s going to be the best summer ever.”

  And then he leaned forward and kissed me again.

  About the Author

  Piper Banks lives in South Florida with her husband, son and smelly pug dog. You can visit her Web site at www.piperbanks.com